OF SAINTS AND EXILES
On the Hawaiian island of Molokaʻi lies Kalaupapa, a remote natural prison that was once the world’s most notorious leprosy colony. From this place of exile emerged two Catholic saints and a legacy of radical compassion. With only two Hansen’s disease patients remaining, two Sisters of St. Francis now carry out the final chapter of a 150-year ministry, serving with quiet dignity until the last patient passes. Filmed over more than a decade, Of Saints and Exiles captures the end of a living community shaped by suffering, faith, and grace.
OF SAINTS AND EXILES
On the Hawaiian island of Molokaʻi lies Kalaupapa, a remote natural prison that was once the world’s most notorious leprosy colony. From this place of exile emerged two Catholic saints and a legacy of radical compassion. With only three Hansen’s disease patients remaining, two Sisters of St. Francis now carry out the final chapter of a 150-year ministry, serving with quiet dignity until the last patient passes. Filmed over more than a decade, Of Saints and Exiles captures the end of a living community shaped by suffering, faith, and grace.
Support Of Saints and Exiles
Of Saints and Exiles is a fiscally sponsored project of the International Documentary Association (IDA), a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
Your tax-deductible contribution will help us complete the film and preserve the extraordinary story of Kalaupapa, its remaining residents, and the enduring legacy of St. Damien and St. Marianne Cope.
Donate through the International Documentary Association
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The Film
Of Saints and Exiles is an intimate, character-driven film set in one of the most spiritually charged and historically significant places in America. With only three Hansen’s disease patients remaining, and just two Franciscan sisters left to care for them, the film captures the end of a remarkable community shaped by exile, suffering, resilience, and grace.
For more than a century, Kalaupapa existed as both a site of profound suffering and an unlikely home, shaped by resilience, faith, and communal care in the face of abandonment and stigma. Early acts of service by figures such as Father Damien, followed by the sustained ministry of Mother Marianne Cope and the Sisters of St. Francis, helped transform a place defined by fear into one marked by dignity. Over time, this small and exiled community produced two Catholic saints and sustained thousands of lives that society had chosen to forget.
Today, two Sisters of St. Francis remain at Kalaupapa. They are not caretakers passing through, but the final stewards of a 150-year ministry. They are the central characters of the film: they maintain the daily rhythms of care, hold the community’s institutional memory, and have committed to remain until the last patient dies. When they leave, Kalaupapa will no longer exist as a lived place.
When suspected of having leprosy, Hawaiians were arrested and inspected at Kalihi hospital in Honolulu.
Saint Marianne Cope (in wheelchair) shortly before her death in 1918 at Kalaupapa.
The filmmakers have returned to this remote peninsula multiple times since 2009, building trust and access that cannot be replicated. The project draws on more than seventeen years of interviews and observational footage, including conversations with patients and clergy who have since passed away. The filmmakers accompanied nine patients on a pilgrimage tour to Rome in 2012 for the canonization of St. Marianne Cope.
The film examines themes of exile, legacy, and historical trauma, with particular attention to Native Hawaiian experiences shaped by colonialism and public-health policy. Through the voices of the sisters, the film explores faith expressed through humble service and the dignity of the human person at the end of life.
Of Saints and Exiles is not a retrospective film about what once was. It is a present-tense act of witnessing. The events unfolding at Kalaupapa cannot be recreated or restaged; they are happening now, for the last time. By documenting this final chapter as it unfolds, the film preserves a human record of compassion and presence before it is irretrievably lost.
The film acknowledges an unavoidable uncertainty that no one knows when the final patient will die or when the Sisters will leave Kalaupapa. That uncertainty is not a narrative weakness, but the film’s organizing principle. When the final patient passes, Kalaupapa will cease to exist as a living community. In its final movement, Of Saints and Exiles bears witness to this transition, preserving voices that would otherwise be lost.
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The Team
JOHN HARRINGTON | DIRECTOR/PRODUCER
John Harrington is a veteran producer, director, and public health media expert with decades of experience creating documentary, broadcast, and interactive media. His connection to Kalaupapa is also deeply personal, informing his commitment to preserving the community’s history and sharing its story with a wider audience. John’s work has appeared on all major networks, and his clients have included the Smithsonian, NASA, PBS, the Department of Defense, Colonial Williamsburg, and the National Institutes of Health.
From 2007 to 2014, John produced the NIH’s Native Voices exhibition, conducting and overseeing hundreds of interviews with Native American, Native Hawaiian, and Alaska Native healers, physicians, and tribal leaders. The exhibition toured more than 100 sites nationwide and was recognized by Congress for its impact. His long-standing work in public health storytelling has focused on translating complex cultural and health issues into compelling human stories.
John produced and directed The Cultivated Life: Thomas Jefferson & Wine, which aired nationally on PBS and received two Emmy® Awards. He is a graduate of the USC School of Cinema-Television.
GRIFF PARTINGTON | PRODUCER
Griff Partington is an experienced Producer, Camera Operator, licensed FAA drone pilot, Production Sound Mixer, and Editor, with more than a thousand B2B and B2C marketing videos to his credit. His client roster includes major brands such as Microsoft, Honda, Discover, Walt Disney World®, and Carnival Cruises, as well as award-winning work for public agencies including Caltrans, NJ TRANSIT, and multiple regional transit authorities.
Griff has served as post-production supervisor on more than 40 Lifetime Movie Network feature films, ensuring projects stayed on schedule, on budget, and broadcast-ready. He earned an Emmy® nomination for directing Hope Has a Home. He holds a degree in Telecommunications and Creative Writing from Ball State University.
LORETO DI CESARE | PRODUCER
Loreto Di Cesare is a producer, director, and cinematographer with more than 30 years of filmmaking experience. He has worked across cultures and continents, creating documentaries that explore people, place, and our shared humanity.
Originally from Abruzzo, Italy, Loreto’s passion for filmmaking began at a young age under the mentorship of Alberto Pandolfi and later led to more than a decade working with the Vatican Television Center, where he refined his craft as a cinematographer and visual storyteller.
CHRISTOPHER MOSIO | CINEMATOGRAPHER
Chris Mosio is an Emmy Award-winning cinematographer whose work spans documentaries, commercials, and nearly two dozen feature films. Throughout his career, he has worked with acclaimed talents including Will Smith, Angela Bassett, and Laurence Fishburne, while also traveling the world to tell the stories of extraordinary people and communities.
His documentary work has taken him from Haiti, where he filmed amputees rebuilding their lives, to Bangladesh in the aftermath of devastating floods, and to his home in Seattle, where he has documented people whose lives have been profoundly affected by cancer.
Chris graduated from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinema-Television.
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The Team
JOHN HARRINGTON | DIRECTOR/PRODUCER
John Harrington is a veteran producer, director, and public health media expert with decades of experience creating documentary, broadcast, and interactive media. His connection to Kalaupapa is also deeply personal, informing his commitment to preserving the community’s history and sharing its story with a wider audience. John’s work has appeared on all major networks, and his clients have included the Smithsonian, NASA, PBS, the Department of Defense, Colonial Williamsburg, and the National Institutes of Health.
From 2007 to 2014, John produced the NIH’s Native Voices exhibition, conducting and overseeing hundreds of interviews with Native American, Native Hawaiian, and Alaska Native healers, physicians, and tribal leaders. The exhibition toured more than 100 sites nationwide and was recognized by Congress for its impact. His long-standing work in public health storytelling has focused on translating complex cultural and health issues into compelling human stories.
John produced and directed The Cultivated Life: Thomas Jefferson & Wine, which aired nationally on PBS and received two Emmy® Awards. He is a graduate of the USC School of Cinema-Television.
GRIFF PARTINGTON | PRODUCER
Griff Partington is an experienced Producer, Camera Operator, licensed FAA drone pilot, Production Sound Mixer, and Editor, with more than a thousand B2B and B2C marketing videos to his credit. His client roster includes major brands such as Microsoft, Honda, Discover, Walt Disney World®, and Carnival Cruises, as well as award-winning work for public agencies including Caltrans, NJ TRANSIT, and multiple regional transit authorities.
Griff has served as post-production supervisor on more than 40 Lifetime Movie Network feature films, ensuring projects stayed on schedule, on budget, and broadcast-ready. He earned an Emmy® nomination for directing Hope Has a Home. He holds a degree in Telecommunications and Creative Writing from Ball State University.
LORETO DI CESARE | PRODUCER
Loreto Di Cesare is a producer, director, and cinematographer with more than 30 years of filmmaking experience. He has worked across cultures and continents, creating documentaries that explore people, place, and our shared humanity.
Originally from Abruzzo, Italy, Loreto’s passion for filmmaking began at a young age under the mentorship of Alberto Pandolfi and later led to more than a decade working with the Vatican Television Center, where he refined his craft as a cinematographer and visual storyteller.
CHRISTOPHER MOSIO | CINEMATOGRAPHER
Chris Mosio is an Emmy Award-winning cinematographer whose work spans documentaries, commercials, and nearly two dozen feature films. Throughout his career, he has worked with acclaimed talents including Will Smith, Angela Bassett, and Laurence Fishburne, while also traveling the world to tell the stories of extraordinary people and communities.
His documentary work has taken him from Haiti, where he filmed amputees rebuilding their lives, to Bangladesh in the aftermath of devastating floods, and to his home in Seattle, where he has documented people whose lives have been profoundly affected by cancer.
Chris graduated from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinema-Television.
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Why this story, why now
Kalaupapa is nearing the end of its life as a living community. When the last patient dies, an extraordinary chapter of American, Native Hawaiian, and Catholic history will close forever. The remaining Sisters of St. Francis—direct spiritual descendants of Saint Marianne Cope—are the last to carry forward a ministry that brought dignity where there was once fear and abandonment.
The combination of vanishing time, unprecedented access, and a 17-year record of filming makes this moment singular. The world will never again see Kalaupapa as a lived village, and the Sisters’ ministry will soon pass into history. Leaving this sacred place in the hands of the National Park Service.
OF SAINTS AND EXILES